Grok was told to ignore sources saying Musk or Trump spread misinformation; xAI blamed an employee

On February 23, 2025, X users found Grok 3's system prompt contained the instruction to ignore all sources that mention Elon Musk or Donald Trump spread misinformation, and Grok refused to cite such sources. xAI engineer Igor Babuschkin confirmed the change, said an employee (described as a former OpenAI hire) pushed it without asking for confirmation and that it was missed in review, and said it was reverted once users pointed it out.

What this means for youThe answers a public chatbot gives can be quietly shaped by one employee's edit, so treat chatbot output on contested topics as one source, not the record.